Building with Style: Fencing in the Wind

Many years ago a friend of mine
at MIT did research to find out
which type of wooden fencing provided
the most effective wind
break. His experiments with a
wind tunnel showed that the ideal
configuration was a fence with
horizontal slats that had small
openings at the top and larger
openings at the bottom.
I recalled his experiments when
I set out recently to design and
build a wind break to protect a
seaside garden that gets blown by
westerly winds. Specifically, his
test showed that the ideal wind
break fence:
• used horizontal boards with
about 50% of the fence open;
and
• was 25% open at the top, graduating
to 75% open at the
bottom (see Figure 1).
My friend's